No Butter Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe

NO Butter Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe

This no butter cream cheese frosting is light, fluffy and melts in the mouth just like whipped cream. A simple, easy and effortless recipe that gets done in less than 10 minutes. Perfect for cupcakes or your favorite carrot cake recipe.

Have you ever wanted to make a cream cheese frosting with just cream cheese? NO butter?

The best part it’s rich, delicious, creamy and melts in the mouth. While I should not favor one of my recipes over another, I will say that this is my favorite cream cheese frosting. Don’t get me wrong both my recipes are good and I love them both. And yet this one – I cannot resist eating it with a spoon. The truth is I love cheese and I can eat cheese by the block.

While both recipes are the BEST, there are advantages and disadvantages to both

This no butter cream cheese frosting is really light and has a whipped cream kinda consistency. Because there is no butter. You can pipe swirls and also use it to frost a cake. And yet, it’s a soft icing so there are limitations to what you can do with this. If I make cream cheese frosting for the family – this is it. Light and fluffy just like whipped cream.

On the other hand, my classic cream cheese frosting has butter which adds stability. Also, butter can be whipped to make a more light and fluffy buttercream kinda frosting. So you can use it in a cake covered with fondant too. It does make some nice firm cream cheese swirls on cupcakes. In addition, you can pipe borders around a cake. For my business, the classic is usually my go-to recipe. Customers love it and I love working with it.

Cream Cheese – No low fat – please use full-fat cream cheese such as Philadelphia or Mascarpone. There is no butter in this recipe so a cream cheese fat is all the stability you get in this recipe. Also, always use cream cheese at room temperature.

Lemon – Just a tiny amount to cut the sugar. And it makes a huge difference. It does not affect the taste. So if you want the lemon flavor you will need to add more.

Salt – Sounds like a lot but it does help cut the sugar a lot!!

Powdered sugar – Use good powdered sugar made from cane sugar, not beet sugar. And you will never have a grainy buttercream or frosting recipe.

Recipe – NO Butter Cream Cheese Frosting

Useful Tips and Tools

If you bake often, it would be a good idea to invest in a cake mixer. Because often we try to mix by hand and then we are too tired to give it enough creaming or mixing. So if you are making this buttercream go head and remove that K-Mix or KitchenAid from your kitchen cabinet. You don’t have to buy an expensive stand mixer, a simple hand mixer works great too.

For buttercream mixing always use a paddle attachment so you do not incorporate too much air into the buttercream. Some recipes, however, such as meringue buttercreams, require the use of the whisk attachments.

Having said that, a simple Bowl, whisk and Spatula with a little extra elbow grease will do too.

Personally, I believe in measuring ingredients by weight, which makes my kitchen scale one of the most valuable items when baking. The same goes for mymeasuring cups and measuring spoons. It’s always a good idea to have these handy and use them when baking rather than trying to guess measurements.

After the buttercream is prepared always keep it sealed well in the fridge. This will prevent any odor from the other foods to attach itself to the buttercream. Therefore, I place my buttercream in a stainless steel storage (we try to avoid using plastic in our home). And I also cover the top surface of the buttercream with cling wrap.

Flavors

Lemon Juice – Replace the fresh cream with 1 tbsp of lemon juice – more if you like a tart buttercream.

Peppermint – Replace 1 tsp of vanilla in the recipe with 1 tsp peppermint extract to the above frosting.

Maple – Replace the cream in this recipe with Maple syrup – the syrup will lighten the frosting so you may not be able to pipe firm swirls but it will still be absolutely delicious.

Caramel – Omit the fresh cream in the recipe – Add 1/4 cup thick caramel sauce (see my homemade caramel sauce recipe here) – and add the caramel sauce at the last stage and you have whipped the cream cheese frosting. The consistency will be softer so you won’t be able to pipe firm swirls. Since caramel is added sugar the resulting frosting is rather sweet. You can add salt flakes to cut some of that and get a salted caramel effect. Personally, I prefer to make the classic cream cheese frosting recipe and then drizzle the caramel over the finished cupcake or cake as an added effect which is usually more appreciated than adding caramel into the frosting.

No Butter Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe

This no butter cream cheese frosting is light, fluffy and melts in the mouth just like whipped cream. A simple, easy and effortless recipe that gets done in less than 10 minutes. Perfect for cupcakes or your favorite carrot cake recipe.

Chef's Tips

Lemon Juice - Replace the fresh cream with 1 tbsp of lemon juice - more if you like a tart buttercream

Peppermint - replace 1 tsp of vanilla in the recipe with 1 tsp peppermint extract to the above frosting

Maple - Replace the cream in this recipe with Maple syrup - the syrup will lighten the frosting so you may not be able to pipe firm swirls but it will still be absolutely delicious

Caramel - Omit the fresh cream in the recipe - Add 1/4 cup thick caramel sauce (see my homemade caramel sauce recipe here) - and add the caramel sauce at the last stage and you have whipped the cream cheese frosting. The consistency will be softer so you won't be able to pipe firm swirls. Since caramel is added sugar the resulting frosting is rather sweet. You can add salt flakes to cut some of that and get a salted caramel effect. Personally, I prefer to make the classic cream cheese frosting recipe and then drizzle the caramel over the finished cupcake or cake as an added effect which is usually more appreciated than adding caramel into the frosting.

The nutrition information and metric conversion are calculated automatically. I cannot guarantee its accuracy. If this data is important to you please verify with your trusted nutrition calculator. Thank you

Or perhaps you looking for a different flavor? Check out how to flavor your existing buttercream recipe or make a new one here.

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About Veena Azmanov

Veena Azmanov is a professional Cake Artist and Food Enthusiast. The Founder, Editor, Creator and Recipe Developer on this blog. Follow her cake and food journey on this blog as she explores new and classic recipes with a twist.

Hey Kim, If you use full-fat cream cheese this is smooth and creamy to work with. Having said that unlike butter cream cheese has a soft texture. It will work great to fill and frost the cake but the texture is soft so piping will not be defined. The classic cream cheese is more stable than this as it has some butter but in general, it’s not recommended to pipe. So keep that in mind. I hope this helps.

I would give this 10 stars if I could! Love that I could make it without butter since I’m allergic to butter fat. I added the juice from a whole lemon so I could have a lemon frosting and it is by far the best frosting I’ve ever tasted. My daughter said even Gordon Ramsey would love it!

Aww, Thank you Nicole and a big hug to your daughter. So happy you enjoyed this recipe. I love this over the classic cream cheese as well because I love cream cheese or anything cheese. Thank you so much for coming back to write this feedback. Love hearing from those who try my recipes. Wish you a lovely week.

Hey Leah. Yeah, I just looked at the recipe. It’s already a small batch. Good for a dozen cupcakes. If you need it for two cakes you will need a lot more to fill and frost. There is no butter in this recipe so it’s not going to be as fluffy as buttercream frosting obviously. Buttercream gets whipped up so it becomes more fluffy. Also, the cream cheese you use will determine the consistency of the icing. I usually use this as a filling and for cupcakes. For frosting a cake on the outside I use my recipe Cream Cheese Frosting

Hello Veena, thank you ever so much for this recipe. It is just what I had been looking for. I do have a few questions. How long ahead of time would you frost the cake? Does the frosted cake keep at room temp? Or do you have to cover it and put it in the fridge? Thank you again so very much for your advice.

Hey El, Since this is cream cheese it is considered a perishable frosting. Which means it has to be kept in the fridge. Thaw an hour or two before serving. I usually decorate cakes with cream cheese a day before so it has a better shelf life even after it’s cut.

Hey Stephanie.. Sounds like your cream cheese has too much liquid in it? The only way to thicken it would add powder sugar which unfortunately will make it too sweet. Is it possible that you can fold in some whipped cream? I mean, whip the cream to stiff peaks then fold it into the cream cheese frosting. (you can also stabilize whipped cream if that helps with the weather). I don’t’ know what the consistency of your cream cheese frosting is so I can only suggest – not sure how it will work at your end.

That is one delicious recipe. Tried it with your Carrot cupcakes and they were to die for. Thank you so much for always sharing recipes that definitely work. Your recipes are so detailed they definitely make me want to bake. Thanks

This recipes was so delicious and creamy – the no butter does bring out the rich flavor of the cream cheese. I used Philadelphia and it sure was rich.. sweet and best!! Definitely making it again. Thanks for the recipe

I would love this type of frosting!! But I have to ask you something personal — I hope you don’t think I’m prying. But do you ever lick your fingers when that delicious frosting gets on your hand/fingers? I would think it an impossibility! I’m definitely saving this recipe.

Thanks Marisa. It’s always very tempting to lick my fingers but one of the easiest ways to add those extra pounds is when you lick those fingers one too many times. So I make a conscious effort to do an official taste test with the spoon at the end. In between the kids and Ziv are always around so I use their palettes.

All i can say is Wow, Wow, Wow Fantastic!!!!!!! A beautifully unique and fantastic pirate cake! I am was blown away by how amazing it is- it couldn’t have been more perfect.Best of luck for video..:) Thank you so much!

VEENA GRAM

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